The bottom line is clear: Our vital interests in Afghanistan are limited and military victory is not the key to achieving them. On the contrary, waging a lengthy counterinsurgency war in Afghanistan may well do more to aid Taliban recruiting than to dismantle the group, help spread conflict further into Pakistan, unify radical groups that might otherwise be quarreling amongst themselves, threaten the long-term health of the U.S. economy, and prevent the U.S. government from turning its full attention to other pressing problems. -- Afghanistan Study Group

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from an insurgent attack in
an undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, July 30th.

The DoD is reporting the death of a soldier previously unreported by the
military. Sgt. Stephen M. New
died from a small arms weapons attack in the Sarobi District of Kabul Province,
Afghanistan on Sunday, July 28th.

Teurlings graduate injured in battle in AfghanistanCivilian casualties in Afghanistan spike in first half of 2013Manning Is Acquitted of Aiding the Enemy

Reported security incidents#1: Two persons were killed and four others sustained injuries when explosives went off in a warehouse on Ring Road on Tuesday. The police said that three dud shells were lying in a scrap godown of an Afghan national Asal Khan on Ring Road near Hazarkhwani. They said the shells went off all of a sudden, killing two young boys, Asad and Misal Khan, and injuring four others.#2: At least five militants were killed and two policemen wounded during a fierce clash between the security forces and the rebels in southern province of Kandahar, an official said Wednesday. Theconflict between the forces loyal to the government and the Taliban fighters happened lastnight in Dicoyat area of Maiwand district.US/DoD: Sgt. Stephen M. New

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Reported security incidents#1:Two targeted roadside bomb explosions left three Air Force troopers wounded this weekend, marking the first successful insurgent attack here in two months. The first roadside explosion took place just south of this airfield (Bagram) -- the busiest and one of the biggest in Afghanistan -- on Saturday and accounted for all three injuries. It crippled the heavily armored Mine Resistant Ambush Protected, or MRAP, vehicle these troops use, which are designed to shelter squads from the roadside explosions that have defined the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The second attack, also on an MRAP, occurred later Saturday evening and did not cause any casualties.

#2: Taliban fighters disguised as police and armed with bombs and grenades broke 250 prisoners out of a Pakistan jail in a brazen overnight operation that raised serious questions over the new government's ability to combat militancy. Fighting continued into the early hours of Tuesday, with explosions and machine gunfire rattling the city of Dera Ismail Khan in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province near Pakistan's lawless tribal regions bordering Afghanistan. The militants then fought their way inside using rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns, and calling the names of Taliban prisoners through loud speakers. "It's completely dark in there. We don't know what's going on but there is fighting," provincial prisons chief Khalid Abbas told Reuters as the fighting unfolded.#3: Afghan authorities say 50 militants, including foreign fighters, have been killed over a 24-hour period in a security operation in the country's east. The Afghan Defense Ministry said in a statement that the dead insurgents included Pakistani, Arab, Uzbek, and Chechen nationals. The statement said the "massive" operation by Afghan security forces in the eastern provinces of Nangarhar, Paktia, and Logar was proceeding "successfully and accordingly."

Nineteen militants have been killed in military operations in different Afghan provinces within the last 24 hours, the country's Interior Ministry confirmed on Tuesday. "Up to 19 Taliban militants were killed, three wounded and 13 others captured as Afghan National Police (ANP) conducted cleanup operations over the past 24 hours," the ministry said in a press statement. The raids were launched, with close support of the army and the NATO-led coalition forces in Kunar, Nangarhar, Kunduz, Zabul, Ghazni, Herat and Helmand provinces, it noted.#4: Two persons were killed when an explosion occurred in a warehouse situated in
Hazar Khawani area near Ring Road in Peshawar on Tuesday, Local TV reported.
According to police, a blast occurred in a storage house in Hazar Khawani
area due to which the roof of the godown collapsed and killed two persons on the
spot.

#5: Four suspected militants were killed as police and other law enforcement
agencies conducted a raid near Eastern bypass, Local TV reported. (Quetta)#6: One policeman was killed and five security members wounded Tuesday morning when a bomb they were defusing went off in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, a provincial government spokesman said. "The police discovered an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) near a car dealer market in Lashkar Gah. A bomb squad team arrived at the scene later. The IED was detonated through a remote controller. As a result one cop was killed and three policemen and two members of the intelligence agency were wounded," spokesman Omar Zwak told Xinhua.US/DoD: Sgt. Eric T. LawsonUS/DoD: Spc. Caryn E. Nouv

Reported security incidents#1: Afghan officials say nine people have been killed and more than 20 injured when they were struck by a roadside bomb. The blast occurred late on July 28 in the Shahjoi district of southern Zabul Province, on the border with Pakistan. On July29, the deputy provincial governor, Mohammad Jan Rasolyar, said a senior police official, two local policemen, and six civilians were killed in the blast. Rasolyar said the target of the bombing was the deputy district police chief. He said 12 others, mostly women and children, were also injured.#2: Pakistani intelligence officials say a suspected U.S. drone strike has killed five people in the tribal region near the Afghan border. They say two missiles hit the Shawal area of North Waziristan Sunday evening when the men were crossing on foot into Pakistani territory from Afghanistan. The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.

#3: Six FC personnel were killed as their vehicle plunged into ravine near here in South Waziristan on Monday, Geo News reported. Political administration said the FC vehicle was on its way from Wana to Tank, when during a turn near Gomal Zam Dam skidded and plunged into ravine, killing six FC personnel on board the vehicle.

#4: An Afghan soldier has killed a soldier and an officer and wounded another soldier and he managed to escape, Afghan media reported Monday. The incident occurred in the Kandgal area of Manugai District of Konar Province Sunday evening, an army spokesman, Harun Yusofzai, told Afghan Islamic Press news agency. He added: "A national army soldier opened fire at other soldiers at a security checkpoint. As a result, one soldier and an officer were killed and another soldier wounded. The attacker fled the area."#5: At least 83 anti-government armed militants were killed during the major military offensive launched by Afghan national army in eastern Logar and Nangarhar province of Afghanistan. The ministry of defense of Afghanistan confirmed that the 83 militants were killed during the “Simurgh” military operaton in Azra and Hesarak districts.

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: Gunmen attacked a coastguard checkpost in southwestern Pakistan on Saturday, killing seven officials and wounding seven others, officials said. The incident happened in the Suntsar area of Gwadar district, 1,420 kilometres (882 miles) southwest of Quetta, the capital of the oil and gas rich Baluchistan province that borders Iran and Afghanistan. "Around 24 gunmen armed with rockets and heavy weapons, attacked the checkpost and killed seven coastguard officials," provincial home secretary Akbar Hussain Durrani said. He said at least seven coastguard officials were also injured in the early morning attack.

#2: THE death toll from twin suicide attacks at a busy marketplace in northwest Pakistan has risen to 51, officials say. The Friday attacks at the bazaar in Parachinar, the main town of Kurram tribal district on Pakistan-Afghanistan border were the deadliest to hit the country during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. "The new deaths occurred overnight", Mehsud said, adding that more than 150 people were injured in the attacks.

#3: The governor of Afghanistan's northern Samangan Province has survived a roadside bomb attack claimed by Taliban militants. The attack occurred as Khairullah Anosh was traveling to work on July 27 in a pickup truck. He and two bodyguards sustained minor injuries.

#4: At least four paramilitary soldiers were injured when a bomb went off in Hangu on Saturday, Geo News reported. According to police, a bomb planted in a motorcycle went off when a vehicle of the Frontier Corps (FC) passed. District Police Officer (DPO) Sajjad Khan said that four FC officials were injured in the attack, which took place in Doaba area of Hangu.

#5: At least 10 security officials were killed and five others injured when unknown
insurgents attacked a security check post in Gawadar district of the restive
Balochistan province. The check post of coastguards was located in Sansar area, a mountainous region
some 100 kilometers away from Gwadar, the port city in Balochistan.

#6: Forty-five Taliban militants were killed as NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) aircrafts raided their hideout in the southern Helmand province on Friday night, a statement of Helmand' s provincial administration said Saturday. "The armed militants were on five vehicles when came under ISAF aircrafts attack leaving 45 rebels dead and three others injured," the short statement contended without giving more details. Meantime, spokesman of Helmand local government Omar Zawak in talks with Xinhua confirmed the incident, saying the attack took place near Bahramcha town late Friday night. However, he did not furnish more details. Neither Taliban outfit nor ISAF has issued any statement.
#7: A bomb blast targeted the police convoy in northern Afghan province of Baghlan on Saturday, police said.

Reported security incidents#1: The Taliban poisoned and captured at least 12 policemen as they broke their fast during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan in an attack in southern Afghanistan, officials said Thursday. The attack took place in Zabul province, where the insurgent militia is believed to have a strong presence despite numerous operations by Afghanistan's Western-backed government security forces. "Tragically, 12 policemen were poisoned and then taken away in a mini-van after breaking their fast yesterday evening in Shahjoy district of Zabul," Shah Nazanin, the district police chief, told AFP.

#2: At least two persons were killed and six others were injured when an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) hit a pick-up van on Kurram tribal region's Sherko road on Friday. Political administration officials told Dawn.com that a passenger van was travelling from Kurrams tribal region's north-western Alizai area to Parachinar area when it was targeted by a planted road-side bomb.#3: 22 mutilated dead bodies have been found from the area of Khyber Agency of tribal area. An official Political staff member of Khyber agency while taking to BBC has confirmed the recovery charred dead bodies, and said that these bodies were found yesterday night from the area of Akka Khel, few kilometers away from Bara Bazar. He said that it is still not confirmed that who are these persons and who has killed them, however it seems that they have been killed during operation.#4: Gunmen killed four people, including a Levies constable, in the Khuzdar district of Balochistan on Thursday. Muhammad Ali, a Levies official, told a private TV channel that militants, who had already taken up positions on a roadside, opened fire on a vehicle near Gazgi Chowki area of Khuzdar. He said the targeted vehicle was carrying Levies officials, who were bringing injured from an earlier firing incident to the District Headquarters Hospital Khuzdar.

Thursday, July 25, 2013

National Guard (in Federal Status) and Reserve Activated as of July 23, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: The first attack took place in Kunduz city, the capital of Kunduz province 250 km north of Afghan capital Kabul, killing three people and injuring four others, police said. "A vehicle of National Directorate for Security (NDS) was running in Bandar-e-Kabul area of the city when a sticky bomb attached to the vehicle by militants went off at 07:00 a.m. local time, killing one NDS personnel aboard and two civilian passersby on the spot," a police official told Xinhua but declined to be named. Four more people sustained injuries and several shops and houses were damaged nearby in the blast, he added.#2: Hour later in a similar bombing in Aqcha district of Jauzjan province 390 km north of Kabul, two people lost their lives and 10 others got wounded. "A bomb planted by the armed militants in Aqcha district and detonated at around 08:00 a.m. local time left two people including a police dead and injured 10 others including four policemen," a local official told Xinhua but declined to be identified. The police chief of Aqcha district Jawad Jahid said the enemies of peace, a reference to Taliban militants, planed explosive device on a rickshaw and detonated it next to a police vehicle inflicting casualties.

#3: Two persons were killed when unknown gunmen opened fire on a vehicle carrying the Frontier Reserve Police (FRP) official in Gulbahar area of Peshawar Thursday morning, Geo News reported. "The deputy commander of Frontier Reserve Police (FRP) Gul Wali Khan was going to his office from home when four people on two motorbikes lay in wait on both sides of the road," police official Imran Shahid said. "They opened fire on his vehicle. His bodyguard and his driver have been killed," Shahid told. A spokesman for the Lady Reading Hospital in Peshawar said the commander was in critical condition.#4: The attack came hours after suicide gunmen and car bombers targeted the headquarters of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in the southern town of Sukkur, sparking a shootout that left seven people dead, two officials and five attackers.

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

The US/DoD is reporting the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring
Freedom. Spc. Anthony R. Maddox died at Landstuhl, Germany from a non-combat
related incident he received Andar, Ghazni province, Afghanistan on Monday July
22nd. News reports that he was injured in a fueling accident on Saturday, July
20th.

CIA closing bases in Afghanistan as it shifts focus amid military drawdown

Tuesday, July 23, 2013

NATO is reporting the deaths of three ISAF soldiers from an IED blast in an
undisclosed location in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, July 23rd. News reports
that a suicide bomber riding a donkey killed the soldiers and their interpter in
the Sayedabad district of Wardak province.
Four ANA soldiers were also wounded in the attack.

Reported security incidents#1:A farmer was killed, when hit a roadside mine in eastern province of Kanahar, where the officials said on Tuesday had been planted by the insurgents.

#2: Two militants were killed and one was captured when Taliban launched an armed attack on checkpoints in southern Afghan province of Helmand early Tuesday morning, the police said. "Several militants stormed an Afghan National Police (ANP) checkpoints in Torgodar area of provincial capital Laghkar Gah at around 1:30 a.m. local time. As a result two militants were killed and one was detained," deputy coordinator for provincial police headquarters Ismail Hotak told Xinhua. He said one policeman was also slightly wounded in the firing in the city, 555 km south of national capital Kabul.

#3: On Monday night, seven Afghan soldiers and police were killed and 13 civilians were wounded when an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attached to a motorcycle was detonated in neighbouring Uruzgan province.

Reported security incidents#1: A man was killed and 10 others injured when two blast rocked Chaman near
Pak-Afghan border on Monday, local tv reported.
Levies sources confirmed that several people were injured in the blast after
which vehicular traffic to Afghanistan was suspended. They said a blast went off near Border Custom Office at the Bab-e-Dosti in
Chaman. The second blast took place near Levies Line. A mosque was partially damage
in the explosion.
#2: A spate of separate attacks has left at least five civilians and 16 Taliban insurgents dead in Afghanistan's southern Kandahar province, officials said Sunday. The militants died while fighting Afghan Special Forces and national police in Panjwai district, provincial spokesman Javed Faisal told dpa.#3: At least two Afghan Local Policemen were killed in a Taliban ambush in southern province of Paktika, where an official said Sunday the incident took place last evening. The incident took place in Matta Khan district of the province, where the government armed oppositions killed two local policemen on a patrol convoy ambush, said Daulat Zadran, the provincial police spokesman.#4: Four Afghan army soldiers were killed and one was wounded Monday when their vehicle was hit by a Taliban roadside bombing in the country's southern province of Zabul, the provincial police chief said. "One Afghan National Army vehicle ran over an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) in Shahjoy district at around 10 a.m. local time. Four ANA personnel were martyred and one was wounded," Ghulam Sakhi Rogh Lewani told Xinhua.#5: Earlier on Monday, two Taliban militants were killed when their IED went off prematurely in neighboring Helmand province, officials said.

#6: According to local authorities in eastern Khost province of Afghanistan, at least six people were killed after unknown gunmen attacked the residential house of Spera district early Sunday morning.

Head of the provincial media department Mohammad Mubarez Zadran confirming the report said at least six people including brother of Spera district chief and his five bodyguards were killed.

Sunday, July 21, 2013

A girls' high school is torched in Kunduz. The perpetrators also plant several bombs on roads leading to the building. Firefighters brought the blaze under control and the building was only partially damaged.

Rod Nordland, for the NYT, does an in-depth assessment of the state of public education in Afghanistan. Since we're coming from a state of near non-existence, those claiming positive achievements from a decade of occupation by western powers can claim progress. But the situation is still abysmal by the standards of most of the world. This is certainly recommended reading for those who wish to understand the reality of Afghanistan today.

This ought to be a blockbuster! New Indian-Afghan film to be released soon, A Man's Desire for a Fifth Wife. "The scenario of the movie is based on a love story where a man goes on looking for a fifth wife, though he is allowed only four." Uh-huh.

Saturday, July 20, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: The most deadly attack killed five members of the Afghan intelligence service and a policeman, when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in the Sangin district of Helmand province, AP said, citing Omar Zwak, a spokesman for the region’s governor. The deputy head of Sangin’s intelligence service was among those who died, the spokesman was reported as saying.

#2: Helmand police spokesman Shamim Noorzia said the other three bombings killed
six civilians and two police officers.#3: Fifteen militants were killed and scores of others were injured in Operation Khyber - II which commenced on July 19 and completed on the 20th as security forces cleared key militant transit points. Four soldiers also died during the gunbattles, officials said. Military sources told Dawn.com that the operation launched in the Kharmatung area, between Frontier Region Kohat and Khyber tribal region’s Bara, had been completed and most of the key areas which served as passage points for insurgents had been cleared.

Twenty-nine Taliban were killed and 24 others wounded in clashes and operations since Friday morning, said the Afghan Interior Ministry and officials on Saturday morning. "In the past 24 hours, the Afghan National Security Forces ( ANSF) and Coalition Forces conducted several cleanup operations in Herat, Ghazni, Nangarhar, Khost and Paktiya provinces. As a result 20 armed Taliban were killed, 12 wounded and six other armed Taliban were arrested by the ANSF," the ministry said in a press statement.In addition, seven Taliban were killed and 12 wounded in an infighting in Kushki Kuhna district of western Herat province on Friday, the district administrative chief Ahmad Farid told Xinhua, adding the clash took place following collecting of illegal extortion from locals in a pistachio forest in the area some 640 km west of Kabul.#4: Earlier on Saturday, two Taliban fighters were killed and one policeman was injured as Taliban launched an attack against police checkpoint in Chardara district of northern Kunduz province, 250 km north of Kabul, the deputy provincial police chief Ebadullah Talwar told Xinhua.

Friday, July 19, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: A bomb in eastern Afghanistan killed five children and a woman after it went off as they were playing with it inside a Taliban commander's home, an official said Friday. The incident occurred on Thursday morning in the remote Mata Khan district, inside the house of an insurgent leader named Abdullah, said Mokhlis Afghan, a spokesman for the governor in Paktika province.

#2: A Slovak soldier who suffered serious injuries after being shot in the chest in a recent attack at the Kandahar military base in Afghanistan is to undergo further surgery, Slovak Armed Forces spokesperson Milan Vanga told the TASR newswire on Thursday, July 18. He revealed that the condition of the other seriously injured soldier, who was shot in the head, remains critical.

#3: Thirty-two militants have been killed in different Afghan provinces in the last 24 hours, said the country's Interior Ministry on Friday. "Afghan forces and the NATO-led coalition troops conducted cleanup operations in Baghlan, Kunduz, Balkh, Logar, Helmand and Kandahar provinces over the past 24 hours. As a result 26 Taliban insurgents had been killed, five wounded and six Taliban were detained," the ministry said in a statement providing daily operational updates.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: An Afghan boy, 12, was killed by his own bombs as he attempted to attack a convoy of Afghan and NATO troops, a Ghazni, Afghanistan, security chief said. Provincial security chief Haji Asadullah confirmed the boy had explosives on his bicycle, which detonated while a convoy of troops. Asadullah added a police officer was injured, but Afghan and coalition troops did not suffer casualties.

#2: Eight Afghan labourers who were on
their way to work at a US military base in Logar province have been shot dead,
local officials say. The men, aged between 15 and 25, were in a van when they were stopped by
gunmen, forced out and shot, a local government spokesman said. The attack took place in the early hours of Thursday morning in the Pad Khwab
area of Logar's capital, Pol-e-Alam.

#3: At least two soldiers of paramilitary Frontier Corps were killed and three others injured Thursday when armed men ambushed their vehicle in north-west Pakistan's restive tribal region, officials said. The gunmen attacked the vehicle carrying soldiers in Kamar area of Bajaur, one of the seven tribal districts, where al Qaeda linked militants have hideouts. An official from office of the political agent, the civilian administrator of the district, said that the FC was on routine patrol in the suburbs of the district headquarter Khar, when the incident occurred. "Two soldiers were killed and three injured in the attack," said the official.#4: AN Australian Special Forces soldier has been wounded during an operation in Afghanistan. The soldier suffered fractures and concussion during an unspecified incident last week but the injuries were not life-threatening, Chief of Joint Operations Lieutenant General Ash Power said.

#5: A main transmission line was damaged by miscreants in Balochistan overnight,
resulting in suspension of electricity to 18 districts of the province, local tv
reported.

#6: Seven Afghan national army soldiers were killed following roadside improvised explosive device (IED) and militants attacks during the past 24 hours across the country. Afghan defense ministry in a statement on Wednesday confirmed that seven Afghan national army soldiers were killed in various provinces of Afghanistan during the past 24 hours. The statement further added that the national army soldiers were killed in IED and Taliban militants attacks in Logar, Ghazni and Helmand provinces of Afghanistan.

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

The DoD is reporting the death of a Marine who was supporting OEF. Lance Cpl. Benjamin W. Tuttle died from
unreported causes at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center after a medical
evacuation from the aircraft carrier the USS Nimitz during a scheduled port
visit in the 5th Fleet Area of Responsibility on Sunday, July
14th.

Reported security incidents#1: Officials say gunmen have killed an Afghan prosecutor with ties to President Hamid Karzai in the latest attack targeting those linked to the government. Police Chief Rahmatullah Safi says prosecutor Ahmad Wali Taheri was killed on Wednesday in western Herat province. Taheri was the brother of Karzai’s adviser on national security, Rangin Dafdar Spanta.#2: Alfred Brenner, 22, a Jackson Township resident and United States Marine serving in Afghanistan was injured in an IED explosion last week. Brenner and his k-9 companion were inspecting a suspected IED device when it was exploded, killing his dog and causing shrapnel wounds to himself and suffered a broken arm.#3: Twelve civilians were wounded Wednesday morning in two successive blasts in the eastern Afghan province of Paktiya, said a provincial government spokesman. "Two Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) were detonated back-to- back when two police mobile were passing by Ghanzi-line and Khost- line areas of the provincial capital Gardez city. The first explosion took place at around 11:00 am local time," spokesman Rohullah Sammon told Xinhua. He said no member of police units were harmed in the incident in the city 100 km south of national capital Kabul.

#4: A blast struck a bus near Peshawar Motorway Interchange on Wednesday, Express News reported. No casualties were reported in the incident. According to the driver of the bus, he saw a bomb attached to the bus via a magnet in the side view mirror. He immediately stopped the bus and removed the passengers and the staff from the bus. The blast occurred after everyone got off the bus. On the other hand, other speculations are that the AC compressor exploded, resulting in the blast.US/DoD: Lance Cpl. Benjamin W. Tuttle

Reported security incidents#1: An Afghan official says a bomb planted on a bicycle in eastern Nangarhar province has killed two civilians and wounded three others. Provincial spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai says the incident took place early Tuesday on the outskirts of Jalalabad, Nangarhar's capital.

"An explosives-rigged bicycle was remotely detonated, killing a police officer and an officer of the National Directorate of Security (intelligence agency) in a suburb of Jalalabad city," capital of Nangahar, the province's police spokesman Hazrat Hussain said.#2: A gas pipeline, 12-inch in diameter, was blown up near Mach town in the early
hours of Tuesday. The explosion disrupted gas supply to several areas in Balochistan but repair
work on the pipeline has not resumed as yet.#3: Earlier on Tuesday morning, one policeman was killed and two others wounded when Taliban laid an ambush attack against a police mobile in Baghlan-e-Markazi district of northern Baghlan province, 160 km north of Kabul, a provincial police spokesman Jawi Basharat told Xinhua. On Monday night, one policeman and one militant were killed and one police cop was injured when Taliban launched an attacked on a police checkpoint in Baghlan's Burka district, the spokesman added.#4: In Kabul, one suicide bomber was shot dead and several militants were injured when they tried to assault a police checkpoint near the Kabul International Airport Monday night, local media reported. No policeman was hurt in the shooting lasting for a while.#5: Eight Taliban militants had been killed in three separate incidents in former Taliban stronghold -- southern Kandahar province, 450 km south of Kabul, on Monday, the provincial government confirmed in separate statements.

Monday, July 15, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: Eleven militants have been killed and 18 others arrested in separate Afghan operations within the last 24 hours, the country's Interior Ministry confirmed on Monday morning. The operations were conducted in Baghlan, Kandahar, Wardak and Helmand provinces. As a result 11 armed Taliban were killed, four wounded and 18 other armed Taliban were arrested, the ministry said in a press statement.#2: On Sunday evening, two policemen were killed and five others wounded when a police mobile was struck by an IED in Nadir Shah Kot district of eastern KHost province, official confirmed earlier on Monday.#3: An Afghan soldier held on suspicion of killing a NATO soldier from Slovakia escaped from prison and walked off a heavily guarded military base with the help of a guard, officials said Monday. The escape will raise new questions about the capacity and professionalism of the Afghan army as the remaining 100,000 foreign troops in the country prepare to leave next year.

#4: In a separate operation by the Pakistan Air Force, jets pounded several militant hideouts in the early hours of Sunday, killing at least 17 insurgents, security officials said. These areas are known as strongholds of the militants from where they stage deadly attacks in Kohat and Peshawar," one official in Kohat told Reuters on condition of anonymity. At least seven hideouts had been destroyed and 13 people wounded, two other security officials in the area said.

Prince Harry was no more than 220
yards away when a US trooper standing aboard an armoured vehicle cocked a
.50 calibre machine gun and fired successive bursts at Afghan shepherds
tending their goats, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. The
shocking incident, which was confirmed last night by the Ministry of
Defence, triggered a war crimes investigation by US military police. It took place on Harry’s first frontline tour of Afghanistan, which, until today, has been shrouded in secrecy. . . .According to a British eye- witness the three shepherds were peacefully minding their own business when they were engaged. Given
the force of the heavy machine gun rounds it is likely they suffered
serious or fatal injuries, though their bodies were never recovered.

This would have happened in 2007. Note that although the story says the M.P.s investigated, I am unaware that anyone has been prosecuted for this murder, nor that any investigation has been publicly acknowledged. I wonder if the U.S. corporate media will bother to report this? -- C

Saturday, July 13, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: At least 12 Taliban militant were killed during clashes with the Afghan border protection police forces in southern Kandahar province of Afghanistan, local officials said. Head of the border police of 3rd zone, Gen. Abdul Razaq said the Taliban militants were killed by border police quick reaction forces in Shina Narai area at Arghistan district. He said the incident took place after Pakistani Taliban militants attacked Afghan border police security check posts from Manzakai check posts located inside the Pakistan soil.

Friday, July 12, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: A 15-year-old suicide bomber pushing an explosives-laden refrigerator on a
wheelbarrow struck one of the two main border gates between Pakistan and
Afghanistan on Thursday, the second attack on the busy crossing in under a week. The device detonated as the boy crossed the gate, killing him and a civilian
bystander, according to Akbar Durani, the home secretary of Pakistan's
Baluchistan province. Four Pakistani border guards and four Pakistani civilians were injured in the
explosion at the crossing, on the main highway linking Afghanistan's city of
Kandahar to the Pakistani city of Quetta.

#2: A suicide bomber targeted an Afghan police checkpost on the outskirts of Kabul, killing one person and wounding two others on the first Friday of the fasting month of Ramadan, police said. "The bomber was in a passenger Toyota sedan. Police stopped the vehicle and wanted to search everyone. The bomber ran away and blew himself up. As a result of the explosion, one passenger was killed and two others wounded," Salangi said.#3: Unknown gunmen opened fire in Mingora area of Swat and killed an on-duty
policemen, local tv reported Friday.
According to police, Constable Aminullah was on duty in Nawa Kali area of
Mingora when armed culprits opened fire on him during Sehar time and fled from
the scene.#4: The NATO-led coalition says one of its helicopters made a “hard landing” in northern Afghanistan but that there were no injuries. Afghan provincial police chief Assadullah Shirzad says the helicopter made an emergency landing but then flew back to its base on its own.NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan says one of its helicopters has gone down in the northern province of Baghlan. ISAF spokesman Will Griffin said the aircraft had a "hard landing," but offered no further details. Abdul Jabar Islami, the head of the province's Borka district, where the incident reportedly took place, told RFE/RL that the helicopter went down overnight in the village of Alaf Baig.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Lawmakers say administration’s lack of candor on surveillance weakens oversightUK to withdraw 5200 troops from Afghanistan by end of 2013US wastes $34M on base in Afghanistan it will never use

Reported security incidents

#1: Afghan officials say at least five people, including two police officers, have been killed by two bombs in the southern province of Helmand. Ummar Zawaq, a spokesman for the provincial governor, said three civilians were killed when their car struck a roadside bomb. Zawaq said two police officers who had rushed to the scene to help the victims died when a second bomb went off.#2: According to another report, an intelligence official was wounded and his guard killed in a roadside bombing in Kajran district of central Bamyan province.#3: Two people were killed and three others injured in a powerful bomb blast near
Kacha Pakha area of Kohat, which is adjacent to Pakistan’s restive tribal areas
along the Afghan border, Local News Channel reported. According to initial details, the bomb planted in a motorcycle exploded on Hangu
road, killing at least two people and injuring several others.SL/DM: čatár Daniel Kavuliak

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

NATO is reporting the death of an ISAF soldier from an insider shooting from an
ANA soldier in an undisclosed location in southern Afghanistan on Tuesday, July
9th. Various news reports that American, Chezh republic and or Slovakia soldiers
were killed or wounded in the attack. News also reports that the attack was at
Kandahar airport which also wounded up to nine additional soldiers. At this time
we believe that the deceased was an American pending on a DoD release.

Reported security incidents#1: Seventeen villagers were killed Tuesday when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb
in western Afghanistan. In the attack in the western province of Herat, Taliban militants fleeing a
joint Afghan police and army patrol placed a roadside bomb along a village road
in an attempt to kill the government troops, local police Lt. Sher Agha said. But the bomb went off instead next to a makeshift vehicle carrying 12 women,
four children and one man, killing all of them, Agha said.

#2: Meanwhile, five people sustained casualties in the mine explosion in Khanshin District of Helmand Province southern Afghanistan. Omar Zwak, spokesman for the governor of Helmand Province, has said that the mine targeting a vehicle of civilians went off in the Wazirabad area of Khanshin District and three people were killed and two others injured as a result.#3: In another incident, three people were killed in a foreign forces' unmanned aircraft attack in Khogiani District of Nangarhar Province eastern Afghanistan. Residents of Khogiani District said the foreign forces' unmanned aircraft attacked the Tatang area in this district at noon today, 9 July, and three people were killed as a result. He added that the killed people were residents of the Wazir area in this district and said: "I do not know whether or not these people were Taleban." Officials in Nangarhar expressed unawareness about this incident.

Reported security incidents:#1: The Afghan army's commander in southern Afghanistan says one of his troops opened fire on American soldiers at Kandahar airfield but did not cause any casualties. Gen. Abdul Hamid said the shooter was taken into custody after the Tuesday morning incident and is now being questioned.#2: One tribesman was injured when his home in Angoor Adda was hit by a mortar shell fired from Paktika province of Afghanistan on Monday, official sources said. The sources said that seven mortar shells fired from Paktika landed in Angoor Adda area in South Waziristan. A tribesman, whose identity could not be ascertained, was injured as his house was hit by the shell. The injured was shifted to a private clinic where his condition was stated to be critical.

#3: A motorbike bomb targeting a tribal elder allied to the government reportedly killed at least seven people and wounded 12 others in Doaba town of Hangu on Monday. "A remote-controlled device planted on a motorbike parked on the roadside went off when a vehicle owned by Malik Habibullah, a local pro-government elder, passed by," local police chief Sajjad Khan told AFP. He said Habibullah was not in the car when the bomb exploded.

#4: "The two policemen had already defused four bombs planted near a government boys' school in the area, but a fifth bomb exploded while being defused, killing both of them," local police chief Mian Muhammad Saeed told AFP.#5: One local leader was killed in a drive-by shooting in the country's restive southern province of Uruzgan, 370 km south of the national capital Kabul. "Sayyed Rasoul Khan, a tribal elder and the former administrative chief of Charchino District, was shot dead in provincial capital Tirin Kot city at around 9 a.m. local time. The attackers fled the scene. Police launched investigation into the case," spokesman for the provincial government Abdullah Himat told Xinhua.#6: two civilians were killed and one was injured when unidentified gunmen opened fire in Kunduz Province, 250 km north of Kabul earlier on Tuesday.

#7: Separately, five Talibans, including a local insurgent leader Mullah Bashir, were killed when Taliban launched an attack on Afghan National Police (ANP) checkpoints in Andar District of eastern Ghazni Province overnight. Two ANP personnel were also wounded in the gunfight that lasted for more than two hours in the province, 125 km south of Kabul, deputy provincial police chief Qasim Desiwall told Xinhua.#8: Thirty-eight Taliban militants have been killed in security operations across Afghanistan within the last 24 hours, said the country's Interior Ministry Tuesday morning.

Monday, July 8, 2013

Reported security incidents#1: Officials in Afghanistan say more than 20 Taliban militants have been killed in security operations in the country's east. The largest operation took place in Wardak Province, west of Kabul, where Afghan National Army soldiers killed 16 Taliban and confiscated weapons, cars, and motorcycles belonging to the militia. A spokesman for the Wardak governor said four additional Taliban were killed in a smaller police operation in the province. In nearby Laghman Province, a government official said two militants were killed in a gunbattle with the Afghan intelligence service. Ten members of the Afghan security forces were killed in the operations, including three national police killed at a checkpoint attack in Nangahar Province.#2: Gunmen opened fire on a tanker carrying fuel for US-led forces in Afghanistan in the Wadh area of Khuzdar district on Sunday. Police said the gunmen on a bike attacked the tanker when it was going to the border town of Chaman from Karachi, and escaped.#3: Militants on Monday torched three Nato containers in the Western Bypass area of Quetta. According to the police, four militants on two motorcycles opened fire on the containers, forcing the drivers to flee. Police sources added that the militants then came close to the containers and set them on fire. Police said that the three containers were parked at the Hazarganji bus stand. "Roaring flames of fire and thick black smoke could be seen from quite far away', eye witnesses said. The assailants escaped unharmed from the site of the incident.#4: A roadside bomb seriously wounded a prominent member of Afghanistan's High Peace Council on Sunday, an official said, while the government announced that recent fighting in the country has killed 14 Afghan soldiers and 64 Taliban militants. Fazil Ahmad, the High Peace Council's chief in Ghazni province, was in critical condition in a hospital with three others, who had been travelling with him, when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb, said deputy provincial police chief Asadullah Ensafi. The car's driver was killed.

#5: In Kabul, the defence ministry said 14 soldiers and 27 Taliban militants had been killed in fighting and in roadside bomb attacks over the previous 24 hours. The ministry said the casualties included 10 Taliban fighters killed in a single operation in Wardak province, west of Kabul. Three soldiers were killed in Wardak by artillery fire and roadside bombs. Seven more soldiers were killed in Helmand province by roadside bombs, and four others were killed in other attacks across the country. The interior ministry, which controls the country's police forces, reported another 37 Taliban killed. It announced no police casualties.US/DoD: Pvt. Errol D.A. Milliard

Sunday, July 7, 2013

In a somewhat unusual announcement, the Afghan Ministry of Defense says that 14 Afghan soldiers and 27 insurgents have been killed in various incidents in the past 24 hours. Based on the news reports I have seen, they apparently do not specify all of the incidents, but they include roadside bombs and gun battles. The Interior Ministry says separately that 37 Taliban have been killed with no Afghan fatalities. This is typical of Interior Ministry announcements, as I have noted before, and does not seem credible. The press reports are assuming that the 27 insurgent deaths referred to by the Defense Ministry, and the 37 by the Interior Ministry, represent separate individuals, and that 64 Taliban have been killed. Until I see some corroboration for these Interior Ministry reports, I am skeptical. The Afghan national police appear to be invulnerable, while oddly the army is susceptible to bullets and bombs.

Zakaria Kandahari, a former employee of the U.S. military accused of torture, has been captured and is in the custody of the National Directorate of Intelligence. As you may recall, he was running a paramilitary unit in Wardak Province which delivered prisoners to an American base there. Seventeen of the civilians he turned over to U.S. custody have subsequently been killed or have disappeared. Afghan officials say they have video of him torturing a prisoner. The U.S. denies any wrongdoing on the part of its own forces and claim that Kandahari was not working for the U.S. at the time he committed abuses. Oddly, however, he earlier escaped from U.S. custody. Afghan officials accuse the U.S. of allowing him to escape. Excerpt from reporting by Rod Nordland for the NYT, please follow the above link:

Afghan investigators uncovered a videotape showing Mr. Kandahari torturing one civilian, Sayid Mohammad,
and said there was substantial evidence to prove that American
personnel were involved in the detentions of the missing civilians. The bodies of 10 victims were found near the Special Forces base
beginning in April, after the Americans left; the last was discovered on
June 4, according to Afghan forensic investigators and family members
of the victims. They had disappeared between November 2012 and February
2013. . . .

Afghan officials have been unable to determine the makeup of the
American base, and believe that that a C.I.A. team may have actually
been responsible for Mr. Kandahari. Mr. Kandahari had been transferred
to Nerkh from Camp Gecko in Kandahar, which is a C.I.A. substation. He
was ostensibly part of a team of Afghans working for a mine-clearing aid
group, which was a cover for paramilitary activity. General Farahi said that investigators had determined that of the last
10 people who disappeared in Wardak, only in two of their cases was
there any evidence of possible links with insurgents.

A French-run bomb analysis laboratory analyzes the IEDs that explode or are found and defused, and traces the phone calls that are often used to detonate them, to guide counter efforts. This AFP story contains an interesting description of the variety of IEDs and associated tactics.

Wakht reports on two incidents in Paktika: Two would-be suicide bombers are shot by police; the story, as is often the case with Wakht, is written confusingly but it appears two police officers were injured in the same incident, apparently because one or more of the suicide vests exploded. Also, three mine planters die elsewhere in the province but the story does not say how.

"Suspending talks with America on the security agreement was right,
because if the international community wants to be allies with us then
we should have joint strategic goals; the Taliban, who are our enemies,
are not their (international community) enemies, but rather Al Qaeda is
their enemy. So if our goals are not shared and coordinated, then it
means that our defense and security agreements with them (the U.S.) have
no meaning," said Dr. Rangin Dadfar Spanta, National Security Advisor
to President Hamid Karzai.

Afghanistan has so-far recorded 1,367 HIV+ cases, mostly in Kabul and attributed to injection drug use. (Since Afghanistan lacks a viable health care or public health infrastructure, I suspect that few people are tested. The true extent of the epidemic is unknown but is likely much higher. I also note that despite the conservative sexual culture, prostitution is commonplace, while homosexuality is underground while there is a rural tradition of the sexual exploitation of boys. Injection drug users may be disproportionately likely to be tested, but there may well be additional, so far invisible, epidemics. -- C)

Friday, July 5, 2013

The US/DoD is reporting a new death previously unreported by the military. 1st Sgt. Tracy L. Stapley died from a
non-combat related incident at Camp As Sayliyah, Qatar on Wednesday, July 3rd.
Here’s some details on camp Sayliyah.

Reported security incidents#1: At least nine people, including six Afghan security officials, were killed and 19 others injured today when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a check post on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in the troubled Balochistan province. There were six Afghan security officials among those killed and 19 others were injured in the suicide bombing in the Chaman region of Balochistan, according to security sources. Pakistani security officials, who did not want to be named, told dawn.com that the suicide bomber blew himself while targeting the vehicle of Afghan border forces close to a check post near the Friendship Gate at Pak-Afghan border.

In the\ southern province of Kandahar, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a border checkpoint entering Afghanistan from Pakistan, killing at least two people and wounding eight others. In addition to the suicide bomber, the blast killed one border police officer and wounded one, and killed one civilian and wounded seven others. Border police say the officer killed was the checkpoint commander, and they assume he was the target.#2: A suicide bomber killed 12 policemen in southern Afghanistan on Friday when he blew himself up inside a police station as officers ate lunch in a dining hall, officials said. The bomber targeted a base used to patrol the main road from Uruzgan province to neighbouring Kandahar, through one of Afghanistan's most volatile regions where Taliban militants have a strong presence. "A suicide bomber detonated his explosives in a battalion station in Tirin Kot, the provincial capital of Uruzgan," Abdullah Hemat, the Uruzgan governor's spokesman, said.#3: Four persons including three women sustained injuries when the rockets fired by militants from Kurnar province of Afghanistan hit a house in Kaga village in the Mamond tehsil in the Bajaur Agency on Thursday, official and local sources said.“The women were present in the house when the rockets struck.

#4: In another incident on Friday in Uruzgan, Himmat, the government spokesman, said a boy and a girl were killed by a roadside bomb on their way home around midday.

#5: The paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) on Thursday foiled an attempt by suicide bomber to attack its camp in Boya area in the North Waziristan Agency. Security officials said a suicide bomber, driving an explosives-laden car, was approaching the FC camp when a security guard spotted the vehicle and opened fire on that. “The sentry’s timely action saved several precious lives as he hit the suicide bomber before he could approach the FC camp,” a military official said. Pleading anonymity, he said the white colour car exploded at 200 meters distance of camp at Boya area, 40 kilometers west of Miranshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan. However, two FC men sustained minor injuries in the blast.US/DoD: 1st Sgt. Tracy L. Stapley

Reported security incidents#1: GUNMEN have shot dead one of the most high-profile female police officers in Afghanistan, underlining the threat to women who take on public roles in the country. Lieutenant Islam Bibi was a well-known face of female advancement but admitted to receiving regular death threats from people who disapproved of her career - including from her own brother. "She was shot by unknown assailants when she was being driven to work by her son in the morning," Helmand provincial government spokesman Omar Zwak told AFP.

#2: Roadside bombs killed four young girls and two schoolboys in Afghanistan on Thursday. The girls, aged 10 to 12 years, had been sent by their families to a river to fetch some water for a wedding that was being held in a home on the outskirts of the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah, Helmand governor's spokesman Ummar Zawaq said. The bomb went off alongside a footpath through a field the girls had taken to make their way back home, Zawaq said. And in the eastern province of Paktika, two schoolboys were killed on their way walking home from classes in the afternoon when they triggered a roadside bomb, the governor's office said in a statement.#3: In other violence Thursday, 11 Taliban militants were killed in two different operations in the province of Lowgar, just south of Kabul, and seven others were wounded, the Ministry of Defense said. One Afghan soldier was also killed.

#4: At least four soldiers were killed and three others injured today in a suicide attack on a security check-post in Pakistan's restive North Waziristan tribal region. A suicide bomber struck his explosive-laden vehicle into a security check-post in Watta Khel, killing four and injuring three other officials, according to sources.

#5: Militants attacked a Nato tanker and killed its driver and injured two others in
Balochistan's restive Khuzdar district on Thursday. Police sources said four militants on two motorcycles opened indiscriminate
fire at the tanker in Wadh tehsil of Khuzdar district. The militants set the tanker on fire before fleeing the scene.

#6: Security forces killed two militants in a clash that took place in Matni area of
Peshawar, FP News desk reported Peshawar. According to sources, police and other law enforcement agencies kicked off a
search operation in Matni and raided a house following a tip off regarding the
presence of militants. During the operation, terrorists opened fire on the security personnel, killing
one cop and injuring another.#7: At least three employees of an international non-governmental organization was kidnapped by unknown gunmen in western Herat province of Afghanistan. According to local authorities the hostages belongs to Norwegian Refugee Council and were abducted by unknown gunmen from Guzara district in Snogerd area.DoD: Spc. Hilda I. ClaytonNews: UK. Civ. Contractor: Mark DuffusNews: US. Civ. Contractor: Kurt Muncy